48th laws of power

3. Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Acknowledgements
PREFACE
LAW 1 - NEVER OUTSHINE THE MASTER
LAW 2 - NEVER PUT TOO MUCH TRUST IN FRIENDS, LEARN HOW TO USE ENEMIES
LAW 3 - CONCEAL YOUR INTENTIONS
LAW 4 - ALWAYS SAY LESS THAN NECESSARY
LAW 5 - SO MUCH DEPENDS ON REPUTATION—GUARD IT WITH YOUR LIFE
LAW 6 - COURT ATTENTION AT ALL COST
LAW 7 - GET OTHERS TO DO THE WORK FOR YOU, BUT ALWAYS TAKE THE CREDIT
LAW 8 - MAKE OTHER PEOPLE COME TO YOU—USE BAIT IF NECESSARY
LAW 9 - WIN THROUGH YOUR ACTIONS, NEVER THROUGH ARGUMENT
LAW 10 - INFECTION: AVOID THE UNHAPPY AND UNLUCKY
LAW 11 - LEARN TO KEEP PEOPLE DEPENDENT ON YOU
LAW 12 - USE SELECTIVE HONESTY AND GENEROSITY TO DISARM YOUR VICTIM
LAW 13 - WHEN ASKING FOR HELP, APPEAL TO PEOPLE’S SELF-INTEREST, NEVER TO
THEIR ...
LAW 14 - POSE AS A FRIEND, WORK AS A SPY
LAW 15 - CRUSH YOUR ENEMY TOTALLY
LAW 16 - USE ABSENCE TO INCREASE RESPECT AND HONOR
LAW 17 - KEEP OTHERS IN SUSPENDED TERROR: CULTIVATE AN AIR OF
UNPREDICTABILITY
LAW 18 - DO NOT BUILD FORTRESSES TO PROTECT YOURSELF—ISOLATION IS
DANGEROUS
LAW 19 - KNOW WHO YOU’RE DEALING WITH—DO NOT OFFEND THE WRONG PERSON
LAW 20 - DO NOT COMMIT TO ANYONE
LAW 21 - PLAY A SUCKER TO CATCH A SUCKER—SEEM DUMBER THAN YOUR MARK
LAW 22 - USE THE SURRENDER TACTIC: TRANSFORM WEAKNESS INTO POWER
LAW 23 - CONCENTRATE YOUR FORCES
LAW 24 - PLAY THE PERFECT COURTIER
LAW 25 - RE-CREATE YOURSELF
LAW 26 - KEEP YOUR HANDS CLEAN
LAW 27 - PLAY ON PEOPLE’S NEED TO BELIEVE TO CREATE A CULTLIKE FOLLOWING
LAW 28 - ENTER ACTION WITH BOLDNESS
LAW 29 - PLAN ALL THE WAY TO THE END
LAW 30 - MAKE YOUR ACCOMPLISHMENTS SEEM EFFORTLESS
LAW 31 - CONTROL THE OPTIONS: GET OTHERS TO PLAY WITH THE CARDS YOU DEAL
LAW 32 - PLAY TO PEOPLE’S FANTASIES
LAW 33 - DISCOVER EACH MAN’S THUMBSCREW
LAW 34 - BE ROYAL IN YOUR OWN FASHION: ACT LIKE A KING TO BE TREATED LIKE ONE

4. LAW 35 - MASTER THE ART OF TIMING
LAW 36 - DISDAIN THINGS YOU CANNOT HAVE: IGNORING THEM IS THE BEST REVENGE
LAW 37 - CREATE COMPELLING SPECTACLES
LAW 38 - THINK AS YOU LIKE BUT BEHAVE LIKE OTHERS
LAW 39 - STIR UP WATERS TO CATCH FISH
LAW 40 - DESPISE THE FREE LUNCH
LAW 41 - AVOID STEPPING INTO A GREAT MAN’S SHOES
LAW 42 - STRIKE THE SHEPHERD AND THE SHEEP WILL SCATTER
LAW 43 - WORK ON THE HEARTS AND MINDS OF OTHERS
LAW 44 - DISARM AND INFURIATE WITH THE MIRROR EFFECT
LAW 45 - PREACH THE NEED FOR CHANGE, BUT NEVER REFORM TOO MUCH AT ONCE
LAW 46 - NEVER APPEAR TOO PERFECT
LAW 47 - DO NOT GO PAST THE MARK YOU AIMED FOR; IN VICTORY, LEARN WHEN TO
STOP
LAW 48 - ASSUME FORMLESSNESS
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
FOR THE BEST IN PAPERBACKS, LOOK FOR THE

5. PENGUIN BOOKS
THE 48 LAWS OF POWER

6. Robert Greene has a degree in classical studies and has been an editor at Esquire and other magazines.
He is also a playwright and lives in Los Angeles.
Joost Elffers is the producer of Penguin Studio’s bestselling The Secret Language of Birthdays, The
Secret Language of Relationships, and of Play With Your Food. He lives in New York City.

8. PENGUIN BOOKS
Published by the Penguin Group
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Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto,
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80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England
First published in the United States of America by Viking Penguin,
a member of Penguin Putnam Inc. 1998
Published in Penguin Books 2000
30 29
Copyright © Joost Elffers and Robert Greene, 1998
All rights reserved
A portion of this work first appeared in The Utne Reader.
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9. A Treasury of Jewish Folklore by Nathan Ausubel. Copyright © 1948, 1976 by Crown Publishers, Inc.
Reprinted by permission of Crown Publishers, Inc.
The Chinese Looking Glass by Dennis Bloodworth. Copyright © 1966, 1967 by Dennis Bloodworth. By
permission of Ferrar, Straus and Giroux.
The Book of the Courtier by Baldesar Castiglione, translated by George Bull; Penguin Books (London).
Copyright © George Bull, 1967.
The Golden Dream: Seekers of El Dorado by Walker Chapman; Bobbs-Merrill. Copyright © 1967 by
Walker Chapman.
The Borgias by Ivan Cloulas, translated by Gilda Roberts; Franklin Watts, Inc. Copyright © 1987 by
Librairie Artheme Fayard. Translation copyright © 1989 by Franklin Watts, Inc.
Various Fables from Various Places, edited by Diane Di Prima; Capricorn Books / G. P. Putnam’s Sons.
© 1960 G. P. Putnam’s Sons.
Armenian Folk-tales and Fables, translated by Charles Downing; Oxford University Press. © Charles
Downing 1972.
The Little Brown Book of Anecdotes, edited by Clifton Fadiman; Little, Brown and Company. Copyright
© 1985 by Little, Brown and Company (Inc.)
The Power of the Charlatan by Grete de Francesco, translated by Miriam Beard. Copyright, 1939, by
Yale University Press. By permission of Yale University Press.
The Oracle: A Manual of the Art of Discretion by Baltasar Gracián, translated by L. B. Walton; Orion
Press.
Behind the Scenes of Royal Palaces in Korea (Yi Dynasty) by Ha Tae-hung. Copyright © 1983 by Ha
Tae-hung. By permission of Yonsei University Press, Seoul.
The Histories by Herodotus, translated by Aubrey de Sélincourt, revised by A. R. Burn; Penguin Books
(London). Copyright © the Estate of Aubrey de Sélincourt, 1954. Copyright © A. R. Burn, 1972.
Hollywoodby Garson Kanin (Viking). Copyright © 1967, 1974 by T. F. T. Corporation.
Fables from Africa, collected by Jan Knappert; Evan Brothers Limited (London). Collection © 1980 Jan
Knappert.
The Great Fables of All Nations, selected by Manuel Komroff; Tudor Publishing Company. Copyright,
1928, by Dial Press, Inc.
Selected Fables by Jean de La Fontaine, translated by James Michie; Penguin Books (London).
Translation copyright © James Michie, 1979.
The Romance of the Rose by Guillaume de Lorris, translated by Charles Dahlberg; Princeton University
Press.
The Complete Essays by Michel de Montaigne, translated by M. A. Screech; Penguin Books (London).
Translation copyright © M. A. Screech, 1987, 1991.
A Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi, translated by Victor Harris; Overlook Press. Copyright ©
1974 by Victor Harris.
The New Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha, revised standard version, edited by Herbert G.
May and Bruce M. Metzger; Oxford University Press. Copyright © 1973 by Oxford University Press, Inc.
Makers of Rome: Nine Lives by Plutarch, translated by Ian Scott-Kilvert; Penguin Books (London).
Copyright © Ian Scott-Kilvert, 1965.
The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives by Plutarch, translated by Ian Scott-Kilvert; Penguin
Books (London). Copyright © Ian Scott-Kilvert, 1960.
Cha-no-yu: The Japanese Tea Ceremony by A. L. Sadler; Charles E. Tuttle Company. © 1962 by
Charles E. Tuttle Co.

10. Amoral Politics: The Persistent Truth of Machiavellism by Ben-Ami Scharfstein; State University of
New York Press. © 1995 State University of New York.
Caravan of Dreams by Idries Shah; Octagon Press (London). Copyright © 1970, 1980 by Idries Shah.
Tales of the Dervishes by Idries Shah. Copyright © Idries Shah, 1967. Used by permission of Penguin
Putnam Inc. and Octagon Press (London).
The Craft of Power by R. G. H. Siu; John Wiley & Sons. Copyright © 1979 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
The Subtle Ruse: The Book of Arabic Wisdom and Guile, translated by Rene R. Khawam; East-West
Publications. Copyright © 1980 English translation East-West Publications (U.K.) Ltd.
The Art of War by Sun-tzu, translated by Thomas Cleary; Shambhala Publications. © 1988 by Thomas
Cleary.
The Art of War by Sun-tzu, translated by Yuan Shibing. © 1987 by General Tao Hanshang. Used by
permission of Sterling Publishing Co., Inc., 387 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10016.
The History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides, translated by Rex Warner; Penguin Books
(London). Translation copyright Rex Warner, 1954.
The Thurber Carnival by James Thurber; HarperCollins. Copyright 1945 by James Thurber.
The Court Artist: On the Ancestry of the Modern Artist by Martin Warnke, translated by David
McLintock. Translation © Maison des Sciences de l’Homme and Cambridge University Press 1993. By
permission of Cambridge University Press.
The Con Game and “Yellow Kid” Weil: The Autobiography of the Famous Con Artist as told to W. T.
Brannon; Dover Publications. Copyright © 1948 by W. T. Brannon.

11. To Anna Biller, and to my parents
R. G.

12. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
First I would like to thank Anna Biller, who helped edit and research this book, and whose invaluable
insights played a critical role in the shape and content of The 48 Laws. Without her, none of this would
have been possible.
I must also thank my dear friend Michiel Schwarz who was responsible for involving me in the art
school Fabrika in Italy and introducing me there to Joost Elffers, my partner and producer of The 48 Laws
of Power. It was in the scheming world of Fabrika that Joost and I saw the timeless-ness of Machiavelli
and from our discussions in Venice, Italy, this book was born.
I would like to thank Henri Le Goubin, who supplied me with many Machiavellian anecdotes over the
years, particularly concerning the numerous French characters who play such a large role in this book.
I would also like to thank Les and Sumiko Biller, who lent me their library on Japanese history and
helped me with the Japanese Tea Ceremony part of the book. Similarly, I must thank my good friend
Elizabeth Yang who advised me on Chinese history.
A book like this depended greatly on the research material available and I am particularly grateful to
the UCLA Research Library; I spent many pleasant days wandering through its incomparable collections.
My parents, Laurette and Stanley Green, deserve endless thanks for their patience and support.
And I must not forget to pay tribute to my cat, Boris, who kept me company throughout the never-ending
days of writing.
Finally, to those people in my life who have so skillfully used the game of power to manipulate, torture,
and cause me pain over the years, I bear you no grudges and I thank you for supplying me with inspiration
for The 48 Laws of Power.
Robert Greene
In addition, we would like to thank Susan Petersen and Barbara Grossman, the Penguin publishers for
believing in this book; Molly Stern, editor, who oversaw the whole project for Viking Penguin. Sophia
Murer, for her new classic design. David Frankel, for editing the text. Roni Axelrod, Barbara Campo,
Jaye Zimet, Joe Eagle, Radha Pancham, Marie Timell, Michael Fragnito, and Eng-San Kho.
Robert Greene
Joost Elffers

13. PREFACE
The feeling of having no power over people and events is generally unbearable to us—when we feel
helpless we feel miserable. No one wants less power; everyone wants more. In the world today,
however, it is dangerous to seem too power hungry, to be overt with your power moves. We have to seem
fair and decent. So we need to be subtle—congenial yet cunning, democratic yet devious.
This game of constant duplicity most resembles the power dynamic that existed in the scheming world
of the old aristocratic court. Throughout history, a court has always formed itself around the person in
power—king, queen, emperor, leader. The courtiers who filled this court were in an especially delicate
position: They had to serve their masters, but if they seemed to fawn, if they curried favor too obviously,
the other courtiers around them would notice and would act against them. Attempts to win the master’s
favor, then, had to be subtle. And even skilled courtiers capable of such subtlety still had to protect
themselves from their fellow courtiers, who at all moments were scheming to push them aside.
Meanwhile the court was supposed to represent the height of civilization and refinement. Violent or
overt power moves were frowned upon; courtiers would work silently and secretly against any among
them who used force. This was the courtier’s dilemma: While appearing the very paragon of elegance,
they had to outwit and thwart their own opponents in the subtlest of ways. The successful courtier learned
over time to make all of his moves indirect; if he stabbed an opponent in the back, it was with a velvet
glove on his hand and the sweetest of smiles on his face. Instead of using coercion or outright treachery,
the perfect courtier got his way through seduction, charm, deception, and subtle strategy, always planning
several moves ahead. Life in the court was a never-ending game that required constant vigilance and
tactical thinking. It was civilized war.
Today we face a peculiarly similar paradox to that of the courtier: Everything must appear civilized,
decent, democratic, and fair. But if we play by those rules too strictly, if we take them too literally, we
are crushed by those around us who are not so foolish. As the great Renaissance diplomat and courtier
Niccolò Machiavelli wrote, “Any man who tries to be good all the time is bound to come to ruin among
the great number who are not good.” The court imagined itself the pinnacle of refinement, but underneath
its glittering surface a cauldron of dark emotions—greed, envy, lust, hatred—boiled and simmered. Our
world today similarly imagines itself the pinnacle of fairness, yet the same ugly emotions still stir within
us, as they have forever. The game is the same. Outwardly, you must seem to respect the niceties, but
inwardly, unless you are a fool, you learn quickly to be prudent, and to do as Napoleon advised: Place
your iron hand inside a velvet glove. If, like the courtier of times gone by, you can master the arts of
indirection, learning to seduce, charm, deceive, and subtly outmaneuver your opponents, you will attain
the heights of power. You will be able to make people bend to your will without their realizing what you
have done. And if they do not realize what you have done, they will neither resent nor resist you.
Courts are, unquestionably, the seats of politeness and good breeding; were they not so, they would be
the seats of slaughter and desolation. Those who now smile upon and embrace, would affront and stab,
each other, if manners did not interpose....
LORD CHESTERFIELD, 1694-1773
To some people the notion of consciously playing power games—no matter how indirect—seems evil,
asocial, a relic of the past. They believe they can opt out of the game by behaving in ways that have
nothing to do with power. You must beware of such people, for while they express such opinions
outwardly, they are often among the most adept players at power. They utilize strategies that cleverly

14. disguise the nature of the manipulation involved. These types, for example, will often display their
weakness and lack of power as a kind of moral virtue. But true powerlessness, without any motive of
self-interest, would not publicize its weakness to gain sympathy or respect. Making a show of one’s
weakness is actually a very effective strategy, subtle and deceptive, in the game of power (see Law 22,
the Surrender Tactic).
There is nothing very odd about lambs disliking birds of prey, but this is no reason for holding it
against large birds of prey that they carry off lambs. And when the lambs whisper among themselves,
“These birds ofprey are evil, and does this not give us a right to say that whatever is the opposite of a
bird of prey must be good?” there is nothing intrinsically wrong with such an argument—though the
birds of prey will look somewhat quizzically and say, “We have nothing against these good lambs; in
fact, we love them; nothing tastes better than a tender lamb.”
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, 1844-1900
Another strategy of the supposed nonplayer is to demand equality in every area of life. Everyone must
be treated alike, whatever their status and strength. But if, to avoid the taint of power, you attempt to treat
everyone equally and fairly, you will confront the problem that some people do certain things better than
others. Treating everyone equally means ignoring their differences, elevating the less skillful and
suppressing those who excel. Again, many of those who behave this way are actually deploying another
power strategy, redistributing people’s rewards in a way that they determine.
Yet another way of avoiding the game would be perfect honesty and straightforwardness, since one of
the main techniques of those who seek power is deceit and secrecy. But being perfectly honest will
inevitably hurt and insult a great many people, some of whom will choose to injure you in return. No one
will see your honest statement as completely objective and free of some personal motivation. And they
will be right: In truth, the use of honesty is indeed a power strategy, intended to convince people of one’s
noble, good-hearted, selfless character. It is a form of persuasion, even a subtle form of coercion.
Finally, those who claim to be nonplayers may affect an air of naïveté, to protect them from the
accusation that they are after power. Beware again, however, for the appearance of naivete can be an
effective means of deceit (see Law 21, Seem Dumber Than Your Mark). And even genuine naivete is not
free of the snares of power. Children may be naive in many ways, but they often act from an elemental
need to gain control over those around them. Children suffer greatly from feeling powerless in the adult
world, and they use any means available to get their way. Genuinely innocent people may still be playing
for power, and are often horribly effective at the game, since they are not hindered by reflection. Once
again, those who make a show or display of innocence are the least innocent of all.
The only means to gain one’s ends with people are force and cunning. Love also. they say; but that is
to wait for sunshine, and life needs every moment.
JOHANN VON GOEIHE, 1749-1832
You can recognize these supposed nonplayers by the way they flaunt their moral qualities, their piety,
their exquisite sense of justice. But since all of us hunger for power, and almost all of our actions are
aimed at gaining it, the nonplayers are merely throwing dust in our eyes, distracting us from their power
plays with their air of moral superiority. If you observe them closely, you will see in fact that they are
often the ones most skillful at indirect manipulation, even if some of them practice it unconsciously. And
they greatly resent any publicizing of the tactics they use every day.
The arrow shot by the archer may or may not kill a single person. But stratagems devised by a wise
man can kill even babes in the womb.

15. KAUTILYA, INDIAN PHILOSOPHER, THIRD CENTURY B.C.
If the world is like a giant scheming court and we are trapped inside it, there is no use in trying to opt
out of the game. That will only render you powerless, and powerlessness will make you miserable.
Instead of struggling against the inevitable, instead of arguing and whining and feeling guilty, it is far
better to excel at power. In fact, the better you are at dealing with power, the better friend, lover, husband,
wife, and person you become. By following the route of the perfect courtier (see Law 24) you learn to
make others feel better about themselves, becoming a source of pleasure to them. They will grow
dependent on your abilities and desirous of your presence. By mastering the 48 laws in this book, you
spare others the pain that comes from bungling with power—by playing with fire without knowing its
properties. If the game of power is inescapable, better to be an artist than a denier or a bungler.
Learning the game of power requires a certain way of looking at the world, a shifting of perspective. It
takes effort and years of practice, for much of the game may not come naturally. Certain basic skills are
required, and once you master these skills you will be able to apply the laws of power more easily.
The most important of these skills, and power’s crucial foundation, is the ability to master your
emotions. An emotional response to a situation is the single greatest barrier to power, a mistake that will
cost you a lot more than any temporary satisfaction you might gain by expressing your feelings. Emotions
cloud reason, and if you cannot see the situation clearly, you cannot prepare for and respond to it with any
degree of control.
Anger is the most destructive of emotional responses, for it clouds your vision the most. It also has a
ripple effect that invariably makes situations less controllable and heightens your enemy’s resolve. If you
are trying to destroy an enemy who has hurt you, far better to keep him off-guard by feigning friendliness
than showing your anger.
Love and affection are also potentially destructive, in that they blind you to the often self-serving
interests of those whom you least suspect of playing a power game. You cannot repress anger or love, or
avoid feeling them, and you should not try. But you should be careful about how you express them, and
most important, they should never influence your plans and strategies in any way.
Related to mastering your emotions is the ability to distance yourself from the present moment and think
objectively about the past and future. Like Janus, the double-faced Roman deity and guardian of all gates
and doorways, you must be able to look in both directions at once, the better to handle danger from
wherever it comes. Such is the face you must create for yourself-one face looking continuously to the
future and the other to the past.
I thought to myself with what means, with what deceptions, with how many varied arts, with what
industry a man sharpens his wits to deceive another, and through these variations the world is made
more beautiful.
FRANCESCO VETTORI, CONTEMPORARY AND FRIEND OF MACHIAVELLI, EARLY
SIXTEENTH CENTURY
For the future, the motto is, “No days unalert.” Nothing should catch you by surprise because you are
constantly imagining problems before they arise. Instead of spending your time dreaming of your plan’s
happy ending, you must work on calculating every possible permutation and pitfall that might emerge in it.
The further you see, the more steps ahead you plan, the more powerful you become.
The other face of Janus looks constantly to the past—though not to remember past hurts or bear grudges.
That would only curb your power. Half of the game is learning how to forget those events in the past that
eat away at you and cloud your reason. The real purpose of the backward-glancing eye is to educate

16. yourself constantly—you look at the past to learn from those who came before you. (The many historical
examples in this book will greatly help that process.) Then, having looked to the past, you look closer at
hand, to your own actions and those of your friends. This is the most vital school you can learn from,
because it comes from personal experience.
There are no principles; there are only events. There is no good and bad, there are only
circumstances. The superior man espouses events and circumstances in order to guide them. If there
were principles and fixed laws, nations would not change them as we change our shirts and a man can
not be expected to be wiser than an entire nation.
HONORÉ DE BALZAC, 1799-1850
You begin by examining the mistakes you have made in the past, the ones that have most grievously held
you back. You analyze them in terms of the 48 laws of power, and you extract from them a lesson and an
oath: “I shall never repeat such a mistake; I shall never fall into such a trap again.” If you can evaluate and
observe yourself in this way, you can learn to break the patterns of the past—an immensely valuable skill.
Power requires the ability to play with appearances. To this end you must learn to wear many masks
and keep a bag full of deceptive tricks. Deception and masquerade should not be seen as ugly or immoral.
All human interaction requires deception on many levels, and in some ways what separates humans from
animals is our ability to lie and deceive. In Greek myths, in India’s Mahabharata cycle, in the Middle
Eastern epic of Gilga mesh, it is the privilege of the gods to use deceptive arts; a great man, Odysseus for
instance, was judged by his ability to rival the craftiness of the gods, stealing some of their divine power
by matching them in wits and deception. Deception is a developed art of civilization and the most potent
weapon in the game of power.
You cannot succeed at deception unless you take a somewhat distanced approach to yourself—unless
you can be many different people, wearing the mask that the day and the moment require. With such a
flexible approach to all appearances, including your own, you lose a lot of the inward heaviness that
holds people down. Make your face as malleable as the actor’s, work to conceal your intentions from
others, practice luring people into traps. Playing with appearances and mastering arts of deception are
among the aesthetic pleasures of life. They are also key components in the acquisition of power.
If deception is the most potent weapon in your arsenal, then patience in all things is your crucial shield.
Patience will protect you from making moronic blunders. Like mastering your emotions, patience is a skill
—it does not come naturally. But nothing about power is natural; power is more godlike than anything in
the natural world. And patience is the supreme virtue of the gods, who have nothing but time. Everything
good will happen—the grass will grow again, if you give it time and see several steps into the future.
Impatience, on the other hand, only makes you look weak. It is a principal impediment to power.
Power is essentially amoral and one of the most important skills to acquire is the ability to see
circumstances rather than good or evil. Power is a game—this cannot be repeated too often—and in
games you do not judge your opponents by their intentions but by the effect of their actions. You measure
their strategy and their power by what you can see and feel. How often are someone’s intentions made the
issue only to cloud and deceive! What does it matter if another player, your friend or rival, intended good
things and had only your interests at heart, if the effects of his action lead to so much ruin and confusion?
It is only natural for people to cover up their actions with all kinds of justifications, always assuming that
they have acted out of goodness. You must learn to inwardly laugh each time you hear this and never get
caught up in gauging someone’s intentions and actions through a set of moral judgments that are really an
excuse for the accumulation of power.
It is a game. Your opponent sits opposite you. Both of you behave as gentlemen or ladies, observing the

17. rules of the game and taking nothing personally. You play with a strategy and you observe your
opponent’s moves with as much calmness as you can muster. In the end, you will appreciate the politeness
of those you are playing with more than their good and sweet intentions. Train your eye to follow the
results of their moves, the outward circumstances, and do not be distracted by anything else.
Half of your mastery of power comes from what you do not do, what you do not allow yourself to get
dragged into. For this skill you must learn to judge all things by what they cost you. As Nietzsche wrote,
“The value of a thing sometimes lies not in what one attains with it, but in what one pays for it—what it
costs us.” Perhaps you will attain your goal, and a worthy goal at that, but at what price? Apply this
standard to everything, including whether to collaborate with other people or come to their aid. In the end,
life is short, opportunities are few, and you have only so much energy to draw on. And in this sense time
is as important a consideration as any other. Never waste valuable time, or mental peace of mind, on the
affairs of others—that is too high a price to pay.
Power is a social game. To learn and master it, you must develop the ability to study and understand
people. As the great seventeenth-century thinker and courtier Baltasar Gracián wrote: “Many people
spend time studying the properties of animals or herbs; how much more important it would be to study
those of people, with whom we must live or die!” To be a master player you must also be a master
psychologist. You must recognize motivations and see through the cloud of dust with which people
surround their actions. An understanding of people’s hidden motives is the single greatest piece of
knowledge you can have in acquiring power. It opens up endless possibilities of deception, seduction,
and manipulation.
People are of infinite complexity and you can spend a lifetime watching them without ever fully
understanding them. So it is all the more important, then, to begin your education now. In doing so you
must also keep one principle in mind: Never discriminate as to whom you study and whom you trust.
Never trust anyone completely and study everyone, including friends and loved ones.
Finally, you must learn always to take the indirect route to power. Disguise your cunning. Like a
billiard ball that caroms several times before it hits its target, your moves must be planned and developed
in the least obvious way. By training yourself to be indirect, you can thrive in the modern court, appearing
the paragon of decency while being the consummate manipulator.
Consider The 48 Laws of Power a kind of handbook on the arts of indirection. The laws are based on the
writings of men and women who have studied and mastered the game of power. These writings span a
period of more than three thousand years and were created in civilizations as disparate as ancient China
and Renaissance Italy; yet they share common threads and themes, together hinting at an essence of power
that has yet to be fully articulated. The 48 laws of power are the distillation of this accumulated wisdom,
gathered from the writings of the most illustrious strategists (Sun-tzu, Clausewitz), statesmen (Bismarck,
Talleyrand), courtiers (Castiglione, Gracián), seducers (Ninon de Lenclos, Casanova), and con artists
(“Yellow Kid” Weil) in history.
The laws have a simple premise: Certain actions almost always increase one’s power (the observance
of the law), while others decrease it and even ruin us (the transgression of the law). These transgressions
and observances are illustrated by historical examples. The laws are timeless and definitive.
The 48 Laws of Power can be used in several ways. By reading the book straight through you can learn
about power in general. Although several of the laws may seem not to pertain directly to your life, in time
you will probably find that all of them have some application, and that in fact they are interrelated. By
getting an overview of the entire subject you will best be able to evaluate your own past actions and gain
a greater degree of control over your immediate affairs. A thorough reading of the book will inspire

18. thinking and reevaluation long after you finish it.
The book has also been designed for browsing and for examining the law that seems at that particular
moment most pertinent to you. Say you are experiencing problems with a superior and cannot understand
why your efforts have not lead to more gratitude or a promotion. Several laws specifically address the
master-underling relationship, and you are almost certainly transgressing one of them. By browsing the
initial paragraphs for the 48 laws in the table of contents, you can identify the pertinent law.
Finally, the book can be browsed through and picked apart for entertainment, for an enjoyable ride
through the foibles and great deeds of our predecessors in power. A warning, however, to those who use
the book for this purpose: It might be better to turn back. Power is endlessly seductive and deceptive in its
own way. It is a labyrinth—your mind becomes consumed with solving its infinite problems, and you
soon realize how pleasantly lost you have become. In other words, it becomes most amusing by taking it
seriously. Do not be frivolous with such a critical matter. The gods of power frown on the frivolous; they
give ultimate satisfaction only to those who study and reflect, and punish those who skim the surfaces
looking for a good time.
Any man who tries to be good all the time is bound to come to ruin among the great number who are
not good. Hence a prince who wants to keep his authority must learn how not to be good, and use that
knowledge, or refrain from using it, as necessity requires.
THE PRINCE, Niccolò Machiavelli, 1469-1527

19. LAW 1
NEVER OUTSHINE THE MASTER
JUDGMENT
Always make those above you feel comfortably superior. In your desire to please and impress them, do
not go too far in displaying your talents or you might accomplish the opposite—inspire fear and
insecurity. Make your masters appear more brilliant than they are and you will attain the heights of
power.
TRANSGRESSION OF THE LAW
Nicolas Fouquet, Louis XIV’s finance minister in the first years of his reign, was a generous man who
loved lavish parties, pretty women, and poetry. He also loved money, for he led an extravagant lifestyle.
Fouquet was clever and very much indispensable to the king, so when the prime minister, Jules Mazarin,
died, in 1661, the finance minister expected to be named the successor. Instead, the king decided to
abolish the position. This and other signs made Fouquet suspect that he was falling out of favor, and so he
decided to ingratiate himself with the king by staging the most spectacular party the world had ever seen.
The party’s ostensible purpose would be to commemorate the completion of Fouquet’s château, Vaux-le-
Vicomte, but its real function was to pay tribute to the king, the guest of honor.
The most brilliant nobility of Europe and some of the greatest minds of the time—La Fontaine, La
Rochefoucauld, Madame de Sévigné attended the party. Molière wrote a play for the occasion, in which
he himself was to perform at the evening’s conclusion. The party began with a lavish seven-course dinner,
featuring foods from the Orient never before tasted in France, as well as new dishes created especially
for the night. The meal was accompanied with music commissioned by Fouquet to honor the king.
After dinner there was a promenade through the château’s gardens. The grounds and fountains of Vaux-
le-Vicomte were to be the inspiration for Versailles.
Fouquet personally accompanied the young king through the geometrically aligned arrangements of
shrubbery and flower beds. Arriving at the gardens’ canals, they witnessed a fireworks display, which
was followed by the performance of Molière’s play. The party ran well into the night and everyone
agreed it was the most amazing affair they had ever attended.
The next day, Fouquet was arrested by the king’s head musketeer, D’Artagnan. Three months later he
went on trial for stealing from the country’s treasury. (Actually, most of the stealing he was accused of he
had done on the king’s behalf and with the king’s permission.) Fouquet was found guilty and sent to the
most isolated prison in France, high in the Pyrenees Mountains, where he spent the last twenty years of his
life in solitary confinement.
Interpretation

20. Louis XIV, the Sun King, was a proud and arrogant man who wanted to be the center of attention at all
times; he could not countenance being outdone in lavishness by anyone, and certainly not his finance
minister. To succeed Fouquet, Louis chose Jean-Baptiste Colbert, a man famous for his parsimony and for
giving the dullest parties in Paris. Colbert made sure that any money liberated from the treasury went
straight into Louis’s hands. With the money, Louis built a palace even more magnificent than Fouquet’s—
the glorious palace of Versailles. He used the same architects, decorators, and garden designer. And at
Versailles, Louis hosted parties even more extravagant than the one that cost Fouquet his freedom.
Let us examine the situation. The evening of the party, as Fouquet presented spectacle on spectacle to
Louis, each more magnificent than the one before, he imagined the affair as demonstrating his loyalty and
devotion to the king. Not only did he think the party would put him back in the king’s favor, he thought it
would show his good taste, his connections, and his popularity, making him indispensable to the king and
demonstrating that he would make an excellent prime minister. Instead, however, each new spectacle,
each appreciative smile bestowed by the guests on Fouquet, made it seem to Louis that his own friends
and subjects were more charmed by the finance minister than by the king himself, and that Fouquet was
actually flaunting his wealth and power. Rather than flattering Louis XIV, Fouquet’s elaborate party
offended the king’s vanity. Louis would not admit this to anyone, of course—instead, he found a
convenient excuse to rid himself of a man who had inadvertently made him feel insecure.
Such is the fate, in some form or other, of all those who unbalance the master’s sense of self, poke
holes in his vanity, or make him doubt his pre-eminence.
When the evening began, Fouquet was at the top of the world.
By the time it had ended, he was at the bottom.
Voltaire, 1694-1778
OBSERVANCE OF THE LAW
In the early 1600s, the Italian astronomer and mathematician Galileo found himself in a precarious
position. He depended on the generosity of great rulers to support his research, and so, like all
Renaissance scientists, he would sometimes make gifts of his inventions and discoveries to the leading
patrons of the time. Once, for instance, he presented a military compass he had invented to the Duke of
Gonzaga. Then he dedicated a book explaining the use of the compass to the Medicis. Both rulers were
grateful, and through them Galileo was able to find more students to teach. No matter how great the
discovery, however, his patrons usually paid him with gifts, not cash. This made for a life of constant
insecurity and dependence. There must be an easier way, he thought.
Galileo hit on a new strategy in 1610, when he discovered the moons of Jupiter. Instead of dividing the
discovery among his patrons—giving one the telescope he had used, dedicating a book to another, and so
on—as he had done in the past, he decided to focus exclusively on the Medicis. He chose the Medicis for
one reason: Shortly after Cosimo I had established the Medici dynasty, in 1540, he had made Jupiter, the
mightiest of the gods, the Medici symbol—a symbol of a power that went beyond politics and banking,
one linked to ancient Rome and its divinities.
Galileo turned his discovery of Jupiter’s moons into a cosmic event honoring the Medicis’ greatness.
Shortly after the discovery, he announced that “the bright stars [the moons of Jupiter] offered themselves
in the heavens” to his telescope at the same time as Cosimo II’s enthronement. He said that the number of

21. the moons—four—harmonized with the number of the Medicis (Cosimo II had three brothers) and that the
moons orbited Jupiter as these four sons revolved around Cosimo I, the dynasty’s founder. More than
coincidence, this showed that the heavens themselves reflected the ascendancy of the Medici family. After
he dedicated the discovery to the Medicis, Galileo commissioned an emblem representing Jupiter sitting
on a cloud with the four stars circling about him, and presented this to Cosimo II as a symbol of his link to
the stars.
In 1610 Cosimo II made Galileo his official court philosopher and mathematician, with a full salary.
For a scientist this was the coup of a lifetime. The days of begging for patronage were over.
Interpretation
In one stroke, Galileo gained more with his new strategy than he had in years of begging. The reason is
simple: All masters want to appear more brilliant than other people.
They do not care about science or empirical truth or the latest invention ; they care about their name and
their glory. Galileo gave the Medicis infinitely more glory by linking their name with cosmic forces than
he had by making them the patrons of some new scientific gadget or discovery.
Scientists are not spared the vagaries of court life and patronage. They too must serve masters who
hold the purse strings. And their great intellectual powers can make the master feel insecure, as if he were
only there to supply the funds—an ugly, ignoble job. The producer of a great work wants to feel he is
more than just the provider of the financing. He wants to appear creative and powerful, and also more
important than the work produced in his name. Instead of insecurity you must give him glory. Galileo did
not challenge the intellectual authority of the Medicis with his discovery, or make them feel inferior in any
way; by literally aligning them with the stars, he made them shine brilliantly among the courts of Italy. He
did not outshine the master, he made the master outshine all others.
KEYS TO POWER
Everyone has insecurities. When you show yourself in the world and display your talents, you naturally
stir up all kinds of resentment, envy, and other manifestations of insecurity. This is to be expected. You
cannot spend your life worrying about the petty feelings of others. With those above you, however, you
must take a different approach: When it comes to power, outshining the master is perhaps the worst
mistake of all.
Do not fool yourself into thinking that life has changed much since the days of Louis XIV and the
Medicis. Those who attain high standing in life are like kings and queens: They want to feel secure in
their positions, and superior to those around them in intelligence, wit, and charm. It is a deadly but
common misperception to believe that by displaying and vaunting your gifts and talents, you are winning
the master’s affection. He may feign appreciation, but at his first opportunity he will replace you with
someone less intelligent, less attractive, less threatening, just as Louis XIV replaced the sparkling Fouquet
with the bland Colbert. And as with Louis, he will not admit the truth, but will find an excuse to rid
himself of your presence.
This Law involves two rules that you must realize. First, you can inadvertently outshine a master
simply by being yourself. There are masters who are more insecure than others, monstrously insecure; you

22. may naturally outshine them by your charm and grace.
No one had more natural talents than Astorre Manfredi, prince of Faenza. The most handsome of all the
young princes of Italy, he captivated his subjects with his generosity and open spirit.
In the year 1500, Cesare Borgia laid siege to Faenza. When the city surrendered, the citizens expected
the worst from the cruel Borgia, who, however, decided to spare the town: He simply occupied its
fortress, executed none of its citizens, and allowed Prince Manfredi, eighteen at the time, to remain with
his court, in complete freedom.
A few weeks later, though, soldiers hauled Astorre Manfredi away to a Roman prison. A year after
that, his body was fished out of the River Tiber, a stone tied around his neck. Borgia justified the horrible
deed with some sort of trumped-up charge of treason and conspiracy, but the real problem was that he
was notoriously vain and insecure. The young man was outshining him without even trying. Given
Manfredi’s natural talents, the prince’s mere presence made Borgia seem less attractive and charismatic.
The lesson is simple: If you cannot help being charming and superior, you must learn to avoid such
monsters of vanity. Either that, or find a way to mute your good qualities when in the company of a Cesare
Borgia.
Second, never imagine that because the master loves you, you can do anything you want. Entire books
could be written about favorites who fell out of favor by taking their status for granted, for daring to
outshine. In late-sixteenth-century Japan, the favorite of Emperor Hideyoshi was a man called Sen no
Rikyu. The premier artist of the tea ceremony, which had become an obsession with the nobility, he was
one of Hideyoshi’s most trusted advisers, had his own apartment in the palace, and was honored
throughout Japan. Yet in 1591, Hideyoshi had him arrested and sentenced to death. Rikyu took his own
life, instead. The cause for his sudden change of fortune was discovered later: It seems that Rikyu, former
peasant and later court favorite, had had a wooden statue made of himself wearing sandals (a sign of
nobility) and posing loftily. He had had this statue placed in the most important temple inside the palace
gates, in clear sight of the royalty who often would pass by. To Hideyoshi this signified that Rikyu had no
sense of limits. Presuming that he had the same rights as those of the highest nobility, he had forgotten that
his position depended on the emperor, and had come to believe that he had earned it on his own. This was
an unforgivable miscalculation of his own importance and he paid for it with his life. Remember the
following: Never take your position for granted and never let any favors you receive go to your head.
Knowing the dangers of outshining your master, you can turn this Law to your advantage. First you must
flatter and puff up your master. Overt flattery can be effective but has its limits; it is too direct and
obvious, and looks bad to other courtiers. Discreet flattery is much more powerful. If you are more
intelligent than your master, for example, seem the opposite: Make him appear more intelligent than you.
Act naive. Make it seem that you need his expertise. Commit harmless mistakes that will not hurt you in
the long run but will give you the chance to ask for his help. Masters adore such requests. A master who
cannot bestow on you the gifts of his experience may direct rancor and ill will at you instead.
If your ideas are more creative than your master’s, ascribe them to him, in as public a manner as
possible. Make it clear that your advice is merely an echo of his advice.
If you surpass your master in wit, it is okay to play the role of the court jester, but do not make him
appear cold and surly by comparison. Tone down your humor if necessary, and find ways to make him
seem the dispenser of amusement and good cheer. If you are naturally more sociable and generous than
your master, be careful not to be the cloud that blocks his radiance from others. He must appear as the sun
around which everyone revolves, radiating power and brilliance, the center of attention. If you are thrust
into the position of entertaining him, a display of your limited means may win you his sympathy. Any
attempt to impress him with your grace and generosity can prove fatal: Learn from Fouquet or pay the

23. price.
In all of these cases it is not a weakness to disguise your strengths if in the end they lead to power. By
letting others outshine you, you remain in control, instead of being a victim of their insecurity. This will
all come in handy the day you decide to rise above your inferior status. If, like Galileo, you can make your
master shine even more in the eyes of others, then you are a godsend and you will be instantly promoted.
Image:
The Stars in the
Sky. There can be only
one sun at a time. Never
obscure the sunlight, or
rival the sun’s brilliance;
rather, fade into the sky and
find ways to heighten
the master star’s
intensity.
Authority: Avoid outshining the master. All superiority is odious, but the superiority of a subject over his
prince is not only stupid, it is fatal. This is a lesson that the stars in the sky teach us—they may be related
to the sun, and just as brilliant, but they never appear in her company. (Baltasar Gracián, 1601-1658)
REVERSAL
You cannot worry about upsetting every person you come across, but you must be selectively cruel. If
your superior is a falling star, there is nothing to fear from outshining him. Do not be merciful—your
master had no such scruples in his own cold-blooded climb to the top. Gauge his strength. If he is weak,
discreetly hasten his downfall: Outdo, outcharm, outsmart him at key moments. If he is very weak and
ready to fall, let nature take its course. Do not risk outshining a feeble superior—it might appear cruel or
spiteful. But if your master is firm in his position, yet you know yourself to be the more capable, bide your
time and be patient. It is the natural course of things that power eventually fades and weakens. Your
master will fall someday, and if you play it right, you will outlive and someday outshine him.

24. LAW 2
NEVER PUT TOO MUCH TRUST IN FRIENDS, LEARN HOW TO USE ENEMIES
JUDGMENT
Be wary of friends—they will betray you more quickly, for they are easily aroused to envy. They also
become spoiled and tyrannical. But hire a former enemy and he will be more loyal than a friend,
because he has more to prove. In fact, you have more to fear from friends than from enemies. If you
have no enemies, find a way to make them.
TRANSGRESSION OF THE LAW
In the mid-ninth century A.D., a young man named Michael III assumed the throne of the Byzantine
Empire. His mother, the Empress Theodora, had been banished to a nunnery, and her lover, Theoctistus,
had been murdered ; at the head of the conspiracy to depose Theodora and enthrone Michael had been
Michael’s uncle, Bardas, a man of intelligence and ambition. Michael was now a young, inexperienced
ruler, surrounded by in triguers, murderers, and profligates. In this time of peril he needed someone he
could trust as his councillor, and his thoughts turned to Basilius, his best friend. Basilius had no
experience whatsoever in government and politics—in fact, he was the head of the royal stables—but he
had proven his love and gratitude time and again.
To have a good enemy, choose a friend: He knows where to strike.
DIANF DE POITIERS. 1499-1566. MISTRESS OF HENRI II OF FRANCE
They had met a few years before, when Michael had been visiting the stables just as a wild horse got
loose. Basilius, a young groom from peasant Macedonian stock, had saved Michael’s life. The groom’s
strength and courage had impressed Michael, who immediately raised Basilius from the obscurity of
being a horse trainer to the position of head of the stables. He loaded his friend with gifts and favors and
they became inseparable. Basilius was sent to the finest school in Byzantium, and the crude peasant
became a cultured and sophisticated courtier.
Every time I bestow a vacant office I make a hundred discontented persons and one ingrate.
Louis XIV, 1638-1715
Now Michael was emperor, and in need of someone loyal. Who could he better trust with the post of
chamberlain and chief councillor than a young man who owed him everything?
Basilius could be trained for the job and Michael loved him like a brother. Ignoring the advice of those
who recommended the much more qualified Bardas, Michael chose his friend.
Thus for my own part l have more than once been deceived by the person I loved most and of whose
love, above everyone else’s, I have been most confident. So that I believe that u may be right to love
and serve one person above all others. according to merit and worth, but never to trust so much in this

25. tempting trap of friendship as to have cause to repent of it later on.
BALDASSARE CASTIGLIONE, 1478-1529
Basilius learned well and was soon advising the emperor on all matters of state. The only problem
seemed to be money—Basiiius never had enough. Exposure to the splendor of Byzantine court life made
him avaricious for the perks of power. Michael doubled, then tripled his salary, ennobled him, and
married him off to his own mistress, Eudoxia Ingerina. Keeping such a trusted friend and adviser satisfied
was worth any price. But more trouble was to come. Bardas was now head of the army, and Basilius
convinced Michael that the man was hopelessly ambitious. Under the illusion that he could control his
nephew, Bardas had conspired to put him on the throne, and he could conspire again, this time to get rid of
Michael and assume the crown himself. Basilius poured poison into Michael’s ear until the emperor
agreed to have his uncle murdered. During a great horse race, Basilius closed in on Bardas in the crowd
and stabbed him to death. Soon after, Basilius asked that he replace Bardas as head of the army, where he
could keep control of the realm and quell rebellion. This was granted.
Now Basilius’s power and wealth only grew, and a few years later Michael, in financial straits from
his own extravagance, asked him to pay back some of the money he had borrowed over the years. To
Michael’s shock and astonishment, Basilius refused, with a look of such impudence that the emperor
suddenly realized his predicament: The former stable boy had more money, more allies in the army and
senate, and in the end more power than the emperor himself. A few weeks later, after a night of heavy
drinking, Michael awoke to find himself surrounded by soldiers. Basilius watched as they stabbed the
emperor to death. Then, after proclaiming himself emperor, he rode his horse through the streets of
Byzantium, brandishing the head of his former benefactor and best friend at the end of a long pike.
THE SNAKE. THE FARMER. AND THE HERON
A snake chased by hunters asked a farmer to save its life. To hide it from its pursuers, the farmer
squatted and let the snake crawl into his belly. But when the danger had passed and the farmer asked
the snake to come out, the snake refused. It was warm and safe inside. On his way home, the man saw a
heron and went up to him and whispered what had happened. The heron told him to squat and strain to
eject the snake. When the snake snuck its head out, the heron caught it, pulled it out, and killed it. The
farmer was worried that the snake’s poison might still be inside him, and the heron told him that the
cure for snake poison was to cook and eat six white fowl. “You’re a white fowl,” said the farmer.
“You’ll do for a start.” He grabbed the heron, put it in a bag, and carried it home, where he hung it up
while he told his wife what had happened. “I’m surprised at you, ” said the wife. “The bird does you a
kindness, rids you of the evil in your belly, saves your life in fact, yet you catch it and talk of killing it.
She immediately released the heron, and it flew away. But on its way, it gouged out her eyes.
Moral: When you see water flowing uphill, it means that someone is repaying a kindness.
AFRICAN FOLK TALE
Interpretation
Michael III staked his future on the sense of gratitude he thought Basilius must feel for him. Surely
Basilius would serve him best; he owed the emperor his wealth, his education, and his position. Then,
once Basilius was in power, anything he needed it was best to give to him, strengthening the bonds
between the two men. It was only on the fateful day when the emperor saw that impudent smile on
Basilius’s face that he realized his deadly mistake.

26. He had created a monster. He had allowed a man to see power up close—a man who then wanted
more, who asked for anything and got it, who felt encumbered by the charity he had received and simply
did what many people do in such a situation: They forget the favors they have received and imagine they
have earned their success by their own merits.
At Michael’s moment of realization, he could still have saved his own life, but friendship and love
blind every man to their interests. Nobody believes a friend can betray. And Michael went on
disbelieving until the day his head ended up on a pike.
Lord, protect me from my friends; I can take care of my enemies.
Voltaire, 1694-1778
OBSERVANCE OF THE LAW
For several centuries after the fall of the Han Dynasty (A.D. 222), Chinese history followed the same
pattern of violent and bloody coups, one after the other. Army men would plot to kill a weak emperor,
then would replace him on the Dragon Throne with a strong general. The general would start a new
dynasty and crown himself emperor; to ensure his own survival he would kill off his fellow generals. A
few years later, however, the pattern would resume: New generals would rise up and assassinate him or
his sons in their turn. To be emperor of China was to be alone, surrounded by a pack of enemies—it was
the least powerful, least secure position in the realm.
In A.D. 959, General Chao K’uang-yin became Emperor Sung. He knew the odds, the probability that
within a year or two he would be murdered ; how could he break the pattern? Soon after becoming
emperor, Sung ordered a banquet to celebrate the new dynasty, and invited the most powerful
commanders in the army. After they had drunk much wine, he dismissed the guards and everybody else
except the generals, who now feared he would murder them in one fell swoop. Instead, he addressed
them: “The whole day is spent in fear, and I am unhappy both at the table and in my bed. For which one of
you does not dream of ascending the throne? I do not doubt your allegiance, but if by some chance your
subordinates, seeking wealth and position, were to force the emperor’s yellow robe upon you in turn, how
could you refuse it?” Drunk and fearing for their lives, the generals proclaimed their innocence and their
loyalty. But Sung had other ideas: “The best way to pass one’s days is in peaceful enjoyment of riches and
honor. If you are willing to give up your commands, I am ready to provide you with fine estates and
beautiful dwellings where you may take your pleasure with singers and girls as your companions.”
The astonished generals realized that instead of a life of anxiety and struggle Sung was offering them
riches and security. The next day, all of the generals tendered their resignations, and they retired as nobles
to the estates that Sung bestowed on them.
There are manv who think therefore that a wise prince ought, when he has the chance, to foment
astutely some enmity, so that by suppressing It he will augment his greatness. Princes, and especially
new ones, have found more faith and more usefulness in those men, whom at the beginning of their
power they regarded with suspicion, than in those they at first confided in. Pandolfo Petrucci, prince
of Siena, governed his state more bv those whom he suspected than by others.
Niccoi o MACHIAVELLI, 1469-1527
In one stroke, Sung turned a pack of “friendly” wolves, who would likely have betrayed him, into a
group of docile lambs, far from all power.

27. Over the next few years Sung continued his campaign to secure his rule. In A.D. 971, King Liu of the
Southern Han finally surrendered to him after years of rebellion. To Liu’s astonishment, Sung gave him a
rank in the imperial court and invited him to the palace to seal their newfound friendship with wine. As
King Liu took the glass that Sung offered him, he hesitated, fearing it contained poison. “Your subject’s
crimes certainly merit death,” he cried out, “but I beg Your Majesty to spare your subject’s life. Indeed I
dare not drink this wine.” Emperor Sung laughed, took the glass from Liu, and swallowed it himself.
There was no poison. From then on Liu became his most trusted and loyal friend.
At the time, China had splintered into many smaller kingdoms. When Ch‘ien Shu, the king of one of
these, was defeated, Sung’s ministers advised the emperor to lock this rebel up. They presented
documents proving that he was still conspiring to kill Sung. When Ch’ien Shu came to visit the emperor,
however, instead of locking him up, Sung honored him. He also gave him a package, which he told the
former king to open when he was halfway home. Ch’ien Shu opened the bundle on his return journey and
saw that it contained all the papers documenting his conspiracy. He realized that Sung knew of his
murderous plans, yet had spared him nonetheless. This generosity won him over, and he too became one
of Sung’s most loyal vassals.
A brahman, a great expert in Veda who has become a great archer as well, offers his services to his
good friend, who is now the king. The brahman cries out when he sees the king, “Recognize me, your
friend!” The king answers him with contempt and then explains: “Yes, we were friends before, but our
friendship was based on what power we had.... I was friends with you, good brahman, because it
served my purpose. No pauper is friend to the rich, no fool to the wise, no coward to the brave. An old
friend—who needs him? It is two men of equal wealth and equal birth who contract friendship and
marriage, not a rich man and a pauper.... An old friend—who needs him?
THE MAHABHARATA, C. THIRD CENTURY B.C.
Interpretation
A Chinese proverb compares friends to the jaws and teeth of a dangerous animal: If you are not careful,
you will find them chewing you up. Emperor Sung knew the jaws he was passing between when he
assumed the throne: His “friends” in the army would chew him up like meat, and if he somehow survived,
his “friends” in the government would have him for supper. Emperor Sung would have no truck with
“friends”—he bribed his fellow generals with splendid estates and kept them far away. This was a much
better way to emasculate them than killing them, which would only have led other generals to seek
vengeance. And Sung would have nothing to do with “friendly” ministers. More often than not, they would
end up drinking his famous cup of poisoned wine.
Instead of relying on friends, Sung used his enemies, one after the other, transforming them into far
more reliable subjects. While a friend expects more and more favors, and seethes with jealousy, these
former enemies expected nothing and got everything. A man suddenly spared the guillotine is a grateful
man indeed, and will go to the ends of the earth for the man who has pardoned him. In time, these former
enemies became Sung’s most trusted friends.
Pick up a bee from kindness, and learn the limitations of kindness.
SUFI PROVERB
And Sung was finally able to break the pattern of coups, violence, and civil war—the Sung Dynasty
ruled China for more than three hundred years.

28. In a speech Abraham Lincoln delivered at the height of the Civil War,
he referred to the Southerners as fellow human beings who were in
error. An elderly lady chastised him for not calling them irreconcilable
enemies who must be destroyed. “Why, madam,” Lincoln replied,
“do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?”
KEYS TO POWER
It is natural to want to employ your friends when you find yourself in times of need. The world is a harsh
place, and your friends soften the harshness. Besides, you know them. Why depend on a stranger when
you have a friend at hand?
Men are more ready to repay an injury than a benefit, because gratitude is a burden and revenge a
pleasure.
TACITUS, c. A.D. 55-120
The problem is that you often do not know your friends as well as you imagine. Friends often agree on
things in order to avoid an argument. They cover up their unpleasant qualities so as to not offend each
other. They laugh extra hard at each other’s jokes. Since honesty rarely strengthens friendship, you may
never know how a friend truly feels. Friends will say that they love your poetry, adore your music, envy
your taste in clothes—maybe they mean it, often they do not.
When you decide to hire a friend, you gradually discover the qualities he or she has kept hidden.
Strangely enough, it is your act of kindness that unbalances everything. People want to feel they deserve
their good fortune. The receipt of a favor can become oppressive: It means you have been chosen because
you are a friend, not necessarily because you are deserving. There is almost a touch of condescension in
the act of hiring friends that secretly afflicts them. The injury will come out slowly: A little more honesty,
flashes of resentment and envy here and there, and before you know it your friendship fades. The more
favors and gifts you supply to revive the friendship, the less gratitude you receive.
Ingratitude has a long and deep history. It has demonstrated its powers for so many centuries, that it is
truly amazing that people continue to underestimate them. Better to be wary. If you never expect gratitude
from a friend, you will be pleasantly surprised when they do prove grateful.
The problem with using or hiring friends is that it will inevitably limit your power. The friend is rarely
the one who is most able to help you; and in the end, skill and competence are far more important than
friendly feelings. (Michael III had a man right under his nose who would have steered him right and kept
him alive: That man was Bardas.)
PROI LING BY OUR 111
King Hiero chanced upon a time, speaking with one of his enemies, to be told in a reproachful manner
that he had stinking breath. Whereupon the good king, being somewhat dismayed in himself, as soon as
he returned home chided his wife, “How does it happen that you never told me of this problem?” The
woman, being a simple, chaste. and harmless dame, said, “Sir, l had thought all men breath had
smelled so.” Thus it is plain that faults that are evident to the senses, gross and corporal, or otherwise
notorious to the world, we know by our enemies sooner than by our friends and familiars.

29. PLUTARCH, C. A.D. 46-120
All working situations require a kind of distance between people. You are trying to work, not make
friends; friendliness (real or false) only obscures that fact. The key to power, then, is the ability to judge
who is best able to further your interests in all situations. Keep friends for friendship, but work with the
skilled and competent.
Your enemies, on the other hand, are an untapped gold mine that you must learn to exploit. When
Talleyrand, Napoleon’s foreign minister, decided in 1807 that his boss was leading France to ruin, and
the time had come to turn against him, he understood the dangers of conspiring against the emperor; he
needed a partner, a confederate—what friend could he trust in such a project? He chose Joseph Fouché,
head of the secret police, his most hated enemy, a man who had even tried to have him assassinated. He
knew that their former hatred would create an opportunity for an emotional reconciliation. He knew that
Fouché would expect nothing from him, and in fact would work to prove that he was worthy of
Talleyrand’s choice; a person who has something to prove will move mountains for you. Finally, he knew
that his relationship with Fouché would be based on mutual self-interest, and would not be contaminated
by personal feeling. The selection proved perfect; although the conspirators did not succeed in toppling
Napoleon, the union of such powerful but unlikely partners generated much interest in the cause;
opposition to the emperor slowly began to spread. And from then on, Talleyrand and Fouché had a fruitful
working relationship. Whenever you can, bury the hatchet with an enemy, and make a point of putting him
in your service.
As Lincoln said, you destroy an enemy when you make a friend of him. In 1971, during the Vietnam
War, Henry Kissinger was the target of an unsuccessful kidnapping attempt, a conspiracy involving,
among others, the renowned antiwar activist priests the Berrigan brothers, four more Catholic priests, and
four nuns. In private, without informing the Secret Service or the Justice Department, Kissinger arranged a
Saturday-morning meeting with three of the alleged kidnappers. Explaining to his guests that he would
have most American soldiers out of Vietnam by mid-1972, he completely charmed them. They gave him
some “Kidnap Kissinger” buttons and one of them remained a friend of his for years, visiting him on
several occasions. This was not just a onetime ploy: Kissinger made a policy of working with those who
disagreed with him. Colleagues commented that he seemed to get along better with his enemies than with
his friends.
Without enemies around us, we grow lazy. An enemy at our heels sharpens our wits, keeping us focused
and alert. It is sometimes better, then, to use enemies as enemies rather than transforming them into friends
or allies.
Mao Tse-tung saw conflict as key in his approach to power. In 1937 the Japanese invaded China,
interrupting the civil war between Mao’s Communists and their enemy, the Nationalists.
Fearing that the Japanese would wipe them out, some Communist leaders advocated leaving the
Nationalists to fight the Japanese, and using the time to recuperate. Mao disagreed: The Japanese could
not possibly defeat and occupy a vast country like China for long. Once they left, the Communists would
have grown rusty if they had been out of combat for several years, and would be ill prepared to reopen
their struggle with the Nationalists. To fight a formidable foe like the Japanese, in fact, would be the
perfect training for the Communists’ ragtag army. Mao’s plan was adopted, and it worked: By the time the
Japanese finally retreated, the Communists had gained the fighting experience that helped them defeat the
Nationalists.
Years later, a Japanese visitor tried to apologize to Mao for his country’s invasion of China. Mao
interrupted, “Should I not thank you instead?” Without a worthy opponent, he explained, a man or group

30. cannot grow stronger.
Mao’s strategy of constant conflict has several key components. First, be certain that in the long run you
will emerge victorious. Never pick a fight with someone you are not sure you can defeat, as Mao knew
the Japanese would be defeated in time. Second, if you have no apparent enemies, you must sometimes set
up a convenient target, even turning a friend into an enemy. Mao used this tactic time and again in politics.
Third, use such enemies to define your cause more clearly to the public, even framing it as a struggle of
good against evil. Mao actually encouraged China’s disagreements with the Soviet Union and the United
States; without clear-cut enemies, he believed, his people would lose any sense of what Chinese
Communism meant. A sharply defined enemy is a far stronger argument for your side than all the words
you could possibly put together.
Never let the presence of enemies upset or distress you—you are far better off with a declared
opponent or two than not knowing where your real enemies lie. The man of power welcomes conflict,
using enemies to enhance his reputation as a surefooted fighter who can be relied upon in times of
uncertainty.
Image: The Jaws of Ingratitude. Knowing what would happen if you put a finger in the mouth of a lion,
you would stay clear of it. With friends you will have no such caution, and if you hire them, they will eat
you alive with ingratitude.
Authority: Know how to use enemies for your own profit. You must learn to grab a sword not by its
blade, which would cut you, but by the handle, which allows you to defend yourself. The wise man profits
more from his enemies, than a fool from his friends. (Baltasar Gracián, 1601-1658)
REVERSAL
Although it is generally best not to mix work with friendship, there are times when a friend can be used to
greater effect than an enemy. A man of power, for example, often has dirty work that has to be done, but
for the sake of appearances it is generally preferable to have other people do it for him; friends often do
this the best, since their affection for him makes them willing to take chances. Also, if your plans go awry
for some reason, you can use a friend as a convenient scapegoat. This “fall of the favorite” was a trick
often used by kings and sovereigns: They would let their closest friend at court take the fall for a mistake,
since the public would not believe that they would deliberately sacrifice a friend for such a purpose. Of
course, after you play that card, you have lost your friend forever. It is best, then, to reserve the scapegoat
role for someone who is close to you but not too close.
Finally, the problem about working with friends is that it confuses the boundaries and distances that
working requires. But if both partners in the arrangement understand the dangers involved, a friend often
can be employed to great effect. You must never let your guard down in such a venture, however; always
be on the lookout for any signs of emotional disturbance such as envy and ingratitude. Nothing is stable in
the realm of power, and even the closest of friends can be transformed into the worst of enemies.

31. LAW 3
CONCEAL YOUR INTENTIONS
JUDGMENT
Keep people off-balance and in the dark by never revealing the purpose behind your actions. If they
have no clue what you are up to, they cannot prepare a defense. Guide them far enough down the
wrong path, envelop them in enough smoke, and by the time they realize your intentions, it will be too
late.

32. PART I: USE DECOYED OBJECTS OF DESIRE AND RED HERRINGS TO
THROW PEOPLE OFF THE SCENT
If at any point in the deception you practice people have the slightest suspicionas to your intentions, all
is lost. Do not give them the chance to sense what you are up to: Throw them off the scent by dragging
red herrings across the path. Use false sincerity, send ambiguous signals, set up misleading objects of
desire. Unable to distinguish the genuine from the false, they cannot pick out your real goal.
TRANSGRESSION OF THE LAW
Over several weeks, Ninon de Lenclos, the most infamous courtesan of seventeenth-century France,
listened patiently as the Marquis de Sevigné explained his struggles in pursuing a beautiful but difficult
young countess. Ninon was sixty-two at the time, and more than experienced in matters of love; the
marquis was a lad of twenty-two, handsome, dashing, but hopelessly inexperienced in romance. At first
Ninon was amused to hear the marquis talk about his mistakes, but finally she had had enough. Unable to
bear ineptitude in any realm, least of all in seducing a woman, she decided to take the young man under
her wing. First, he had to understand that this was war, and that the beautiful countess was a citadel to
which he had to lay siege as carefully as any general. Every step had to be planned and executed with the
utmost attention to detail and nuance.
Instructing the marquis to start over, Ninon told him to approach the countess with a bit of distance, an
air of nonchalance. The next time the two were alone together, she said, he would confide in the countess
as would a friend but not a potential lover. This was to throw her off the scent. The countess was no
longer to take his interest in her for granted—perhaps he was only interested in friendship.
Ninon planned ahead. Once the countess was confused, it would be time to make her jealous. At the
next encounter, at a major fête in Paris, the marquis would show up with a beautiful young woman at his
side. This beautiful young woman had equally beautiful friends, so that wherever the countess would now
see the marquis, he would be surrounded by the most stunning young women in Paris. Not only would the
countess be seething with jealousy, she would come to see the marquis as someone who was desired by
others. It was hard for Ninon to make the marquis understand, but she patiently explained that a woman
who is interested in a man wants to see that other women are interested in him, too. Not only does that
give him instant value, it makes it all the more satisfying to snatch him from their clutches.
Once the countess was jealous but intrigued, it would be time to beguile her. On Ninon’s instructions,
the marquis would fail to show up at affairs where the countess expected to see him. Then, suddenly, he
would appear at salons he had never frequented before, but that the countess attended often. She would be
unable to predict his moves. All of this would push her into the state of emotional confusion that is a
prerequisite for successful seduction.
These moves were executed, and took several weeks. Ninon monitored the marquis’s progress:
Through her network of spies, she heard how the countess would laugh a little harder at his witticisms,
listen more closely to his stories. She heard that the countess was suddenly asking questions about him.
Her friends told her that at social affairs the countess would often look up at the marquis, following his
steps. Ninon felt certain that the young woman was falling under his spell. It was a matter of weeks now,
maybe a month or two, but if all went smoothly, the citadel would fall.

33. A few days later the marquis was at the countess’s home. They were alone. Suddenly he was a different
man: This time acting on his own impulse, rather than following Ninon’s instructions, he took the
countess’s hands and told her he was in love with her. The young woman seemed confused, a reaction he
did not expect. She became polite, then excused herself. For the rest of the evening she avoided his eyes,
was not there to say good-night to him. The next few times he visited he was told she was not at home.
When she finally admitted him again, the two felt awkward and uncomfortable with each other. The spell
was broken.
Interpretation
Ninon de Lenclos knew everything about the art of love. The greatest writ ers, thinkers, and politicians of
the time had been her lovers—men like La Rochefoucauld, Molière, and Richelieu. Seduction was a game
to her, to be practiced with skill. As she got older, and her reputation grew, the most important families in
France would send their sons to her to be instructed in matters of love.
Ninon knew that men and women are very different, but when it comes to seduction they feel the same:
Deep down inside, they often sense when they are being seduced, but they give in because they enjoy the
feeling of being led along. It is a pleasure to let go, and to allow the other person to detour you into a
strange country. Everything in seduction, however, depends on suggestion. You cannot announce your
intentions or reveal them directly in words. Instead you must throw your targets off the scent. To surrender
to your guidance they must be appropriately confused. You have to scramble your signals—appear
interested in another man or woman (the decoy), then hint at being interested in the target, then feign
indifference, on and on. Such patterns not only confuse, they excite.
Imagine this story from the countess’s perspective: After a few of the marquis’s moves, she sensed the
marquis was playing some sort of game, but the game delighted her. She did not know where he was
leading her, but so much the better. His moves intrigued her, each of them keeping her waiting for the next
one—she even enjoyed her jealousy and confusion, for sometimes any emotion is better than the boredom
of security. Perhaps the marquis had ulterior motives; most men do. But she was willing to wait and see,
and probably if she had been made to wait long enough, what he was up to would not have mattered.
The moment the marquis uttered that fatal word “love,” however, all was changed. This was no longer
a game with moves, it was an artless show of passion. His intention was revealed: He was seducing her.
This put everything he had done in a new light. All that before had been charming now seemed ugly and
conniving; the countess felt embarrassed and used. A door closed that would never open again.
Do not be held a cheat, even though it is impossible to live today without being one.
Let your greatest cunning lie in covering up what looks like cunning.
Ballasar Gracián, 1601-1658
OBSERVANCE OF THE LAW
In 1850 the young Otto von Bismarck, then a thirty-five-year-old deputy in the Prussian parliament, was at
a turning point in his career. The issues of the day were the unification of the many states (including
Prussia) into which Germany was then divided, and a war against Austria, the powerful neighbor to the
south that hoped to keep the Germans weak and at odds, even threatening to intervene if they tried to unite.

34. Prince William, next in line to be Prussia’s king, was in favor of going to war, and the parliament rallied
to the cause, prepared to back any mobilization of troops. The only ones to oppose war were the present
king, Frederick William IV, and his ministers, who preferred to appease the powerful Austrians.
Throughout his career, Bismarck had been a loyal, even passionate supporter of Prussian might and
power. He dreamed of German unification, of going to war against Austria and humiliating the country
that for so long had kept Germany divided. A former soldier, he saw warfare as a glorious business.
This, after all, was the man who years later would say, “The great questions of the time will be
decided, not by speeches and resolutions, but by iron and blood.”
Passionate patriot and lover of military glory, Bismarck nevertheless gave a speech in parliament at the
height of the war fever that astonished all who heard it. “Woe unto the statesman,” he said, “who makes
war without a reason that will still be valid when the war is over! After the war, you will all look
differently at these questions. Will you then have the courage to turn to the peasant contemplating the ashes
of his farm, to the man who has been crippled, to the father who has lost his children?” Not only did
Bismarck go on to talk of the madness of this war, but, strangest of all, he praised Austria and defended
her actions. This went against everything he had stood for. The consequences were immediate. Bismarck
was against the war—what could this possibly mean? Other deputies were confused, and several of them
changed their votes. Eventually the king and his ministers won out, and war was averted.
A few weeks after Bismarck’s infamous speech, the king, grateful that he had spoken for peace, made
him a cabinet minister. A few years later he became the Prussian premier. In this role he eventually led
his country and a peace-loving king into a war against Austria, crushing the former empire and
establishing a mighty German state, with Prussia at its head.
Interpretation
At the time of his speech in 1850, Bismarck made several calculations. First, he sensed that the Prussian
military, which had not kept pace with other European armies, was unready for war—that Austria, in fact,
might very well win, a disastrous result for the future. Second, if the war were lost and Bismarck had
supported it, his career would be gravely jeopardized. The king and his conservative ministers wanted
peace; Bismarck wanted power. The answer was to throw people off the scent by supporting a cause he
detested, saying things he would laugh at if said by another. A whole country was fooled. It was because
of Bismarck’s speech that the king made him a minister, a position from which he quickly rose to be prime
minister, attaining the power to strengthen the Prussian military and accomplish what he had wanted all
along: the humiliation of Austria and the unification of Germany under Prussia’s leadership.
Bismarck was certainly one of the cleverest statesman who ever lived, a master of strategy and
deception. No one suspected what he was up to in this case. Had he announced his real intentions, arguing
that it was better to wait now and fight later, he would not have won the argument, since most Prussians
wanted war at that moment and mistakenly believed that their army was superior to the Austrians. Had he
played up to the king, asking to be made a minister in exchange for supporting peace, he would not have
succeeded either: The king would have distrusted his ambition and doubted his sincerity.
By being completely insincere and sending misleading signals, however, he deceived everyone,
concealed his purpose, and attained everything he wanted. Such is the power of hiding your intentions.
KEYS TO POWER

35. Most people are open books. They say what they feel, blurt out their opinions at every opportunity, and
constantly reveal their plans and intentions. They do this for several reasons. First, it is easy and natural
to always want to talk about one’s feelings and plans for the future. It takes effort to control your tongue
and monitor what you reveal. Second, many believe that by being honest and open they are winning
people’s hearts and showing their good nature.They are greatly deluded. Honesty is actually a blunt
instrument, which bloodies more than it cuts. Your honesty is likely to offend people; it is much more
prudent to tailor your words, telling people what they want to hear rather than the coarse and ugly truth of
what you feel or think. More important, by being unabashedly open you make yourself so predictable and
familiar that it is almost impossible to respect or fear you, and power will not accrue to a person who
cannot inspire such emotions.
If you yearn for power, quickly lay honesty aside, and train yourself in the art of concealing your
intentions. Master the art and you will always have the upper hand. Basic to an ability to conceal one’s
intentions is a simple truth about human nature: Our first instinct is to always trust appearances. We
cannot go around doubting the reality of what we see and hear—constantly imagining that appearances
concealed something else would exhaust and terrify us. This fact makes it relatively easy to conceal one’s
intentions. Simply dangle an object you seem to desire, a goal you seem to aim for, in front of people’s
eyes and they will take the appearance for reality. Once their eyes focus on the decoy, they will fail to
notice what you are really up to. In seduction, set up conflicting signals, such as desire and indifference,
and you not only throw them off the scent, you inflame their desire to possess you.
A tactic that is often effective in setting up a red herring is to appear to support an idea or cause that is
actually contrary to your own sentiments. (Bismarck used this to great effect in his speech in 1850.) Most
people will believe you have experienced a change of heart, since it is so unusual to play so lightly with
something as emotional as one’s opinions and values. The same applies for any decoyed object of desire:
Seem to want something in which you are actually not at all interested and your enemies will be thrown
off the scent, making all kinds of errors in their calculations.
During the War of the Spanish Succession in 1711, the Duke of Marlborough, head of the English army,
wanted to destroy a key French fort, because it protected a vital thoroughfare into France. Yet he knew
that if he destroyed it, the French would realize what he wanted—to advance down that road. Instead,
then, he merely captured the fort, and garrisoned it with some of his troops, making it appear as if he
wanted it for some purpose of his own. The French attacked the fort and the duke let them recapture it.
Once they had it back, though, they destroyed it, figuring that the duke had wanted it for some important
reason. Now that the fort was gone, the road was unprotected, and Marlborough could easily march into
France.
Use this tactic in the following manner: Hide your intentions not by closing up (with the risk of
appearing secretive, and making people suspicious) but by talking endlessly about your desires and goals
—just not your real ones. You will kill three birds with one stone: You appear friendly, open, and
trusting; you conceal your intentions; and you send your rivals on time-consuming wild-goose chases.
Another powerful tool in throwing people off the scent is false sincerity. People easily mistake
sincerity for honesty. Remember—their first instinct is to trust appearances, and since they value honesty
and want to believe in the honesty of those around them, they will rarely doubt you or see through your
act. Seeming to believe what you say gives your words great weight. This is how Iago deceived and
destroyed Othello: Given the depth of his emotions, the apparent sincerity of his concerns about Desde
mona’s supposed infidelity, how could Othello distrust him? This is also how the great con artist Yellow
Kid Weil pulled the wool over suckers’ eyes: Seeming to believe so deeply in the decoyed object he was
dangling in front of them (a phony stock, a touted racehorse), he made its reality hard to doubt. It is

36. important, of course, not to go too far in this area. Sincerity is a tricky tool: Appear overpassionate and
you raise suspicions. Be measured and believable or your ruse will seem the put-on that it is.
To make your false sincerity an effective weapon in concealing your intentions, espouse a belief in
honesty and forthrightness as important social values. Do this as publicly as possible. Emphasize your
position on this subject by occasionally divulging some heartfelt thought—though only one that is actually
meaningless or irrelevant, of course. Napoleon’s minister Talleyrand was a master at taking people into
his confidence by revealing some apparent secret. This feigned confidence—a decoy—would then elicit a
real confidence on the other person’s part.
Remember: The best deceivers do everything they can to cloak their roguish qualities. They cultivate an
air of honesty in one area to disguise their dishonesty in others. Honesty is merely another decoy in their
arsenal of weapons.

37. PART II: USE SMOKE SCREENS TO DISGUISE YOUR ACTIONS
Deception is always the best strategy, but the best deceptions require a screen of smoke to distract
people attention from your real purpose. The bland exterior—like the unreadable poker face—is often
the perfect smoke screen, hiding your intentions behind the comfortable and familiar. If you lead the
sucker down a familiar path, he won’t catch on when you lead him into a trap.
OBSERVANCE OF THE LAW I
In 1910, a Mr. Sam Geezil of Chicago sold his warehouse business for close to $1 million. He settled
down to semiretirement and the managing of his many properties, but deep inside he itched for the old
days of deal-making. One day a young man named Joseph Weil visited his office, wanting to buy an
apartment he had up for sale. Geezil explained the terms: The price was $8,000, but he only required a
down payment of $2,000. Weil said he would sleep on it, but he came back the following day and offered
to pay the full $8,000 in cash, if Geezil could wait a couple of days, until a deal Weil was working on
came through. Even in semiretirement, a clever businessman like Geezil was curious as to how Weil
would be able to come up with so much cash (roughly $150,000 today) so quickly. Weil seemed reluctant
to say, and quickly changed the subject, but Geezil was persistent. Finally, after assurances of
confidentiality, Weil told Geezil the following story.
THE KING OF ISRAEL IGNS WORSHIP OF THE
Then Jehu assembled all the people, and said to them, “Ahab served Ba‘al a little; but Jehu will serve
him much more. Now therefore call to me all the prophets of Ba’al, all his worshippers and all his
priests; let none be missing, for I have a great sacrifice to offer to Ba‘al; whoever is missing shall not
live.” But Jehu did it with cunning in order to destroy the worshippers of Ba’al. And Jehu ordered,
“Sanctify a solemn assembly for Ba‘al. ”So they proclaimed it. And Jehu sent throughout all Israel;
and all the worshippers of Ba’al came, so that there was not a man left who did not come. And they
entered the house of Ba‘al, and the house of Ba’al was filled from one end to the other.... Then Jehu
went into the house of Ba‘al ... and he said to the worshippers of Ba’al, “Search, and see that there is
no servant of the LORD here among you, but only the worshippers of Ba‘al.“Then he went in to offer
sacrifices and burnt offerings. Now Jehu had stationed eighty men outside, and said, ”The man who
allows any of those whom I give into your hands to escape shall forfeit his life.“ So as soon as he had
made an end of offering the burnt offering, Jehu said to the guard and to the officers, ”Go in and slay
them; let not a man escape. ” So when they put them to the sword, the guard and the officers cast them
out and went into the inner room of the house of Ba’al and they brought out the pillar that was in the
house of Ba‘al and burned it. And they demolished the pillar of Ba’al and demolished the house of
Ba‘al, and made it a latrine to this day. Thus Jehu wiped out Ba’al from Israel.
OLD TESTAMENT, 2 KINGS 10:18-28
Weil’s uncle was the secretary to a coterie of multimillionaire financiers. These wealthy gentlemen had
purchased a hunting lodge in Michigan ten years ago, at a cheap price. They had not used the lodge for a
few years, so they had decided to sell it and had asked Weil’s uncle to get whatever he could for it. For

38. reasons—good reasons—of his own, the uncle had been nursing a grudge against the millionaires for
years; this was his chance to get back at them. He would sell the property for $35,000 to a set up man
(whom it was Weil’s job to find). The financiers were too wealthy to worry about this low price. The set-
up man would then turn around and sell the property again for its real price, around $155,000. The uncle,
Weil, and the third man would split the profits from this second sale. It was all legal and for a good cause
—the uncle’s just retribution.
Geezil had heard enough: He wanted to be the set-up buyer. Weil was reluctant to involve him, but
Geezil would not back down: The idea of a large profit, plus a little adventure, had him champing at the
bit. Weil explained that Geezil would have to put up the $35,000 in cash to bring the deal off. Geezil, a
millionaire, said he could get the money with a snap of his fingers. Weil finally relented and agreed to
arrange a meeting between the uncle, Geezil, and the financiers, in the town of Galesburg, Illinois.
On the train ride to Galesburg, Geezil met the uncle—an impressive man, with whom he avidly
discussed business. Weil also brought along a companion, a somewhat paunchy man named George
Gross. Weil explained to Geezil that he himself was a boxing trainer, that Gross was one of the promising
prizefighters he trained, and that he had asked Gross to come along to make sure the fighter stayed in
shape. For a promising fighter, Gross was unimpressive looking—he had gray hair and a beer belly—but
Geezil was so excited about the deal that he didn’t really think about the man’s flabby appearance.
Once in Galesburg, Weil and his uncle went to fetch the financiers while Geezil waited in a hotel room
with Gross, who promptly put on his boxing trunks. As Geezil half watched, Gross began to shadowbox.
Distracted as he was, Geezil ignored how badly the boxer wheezed after a few minutes of exercise,
although his style seemed real enough. An hour later, Weil and his uncle reappeared with the financiers,
an impressive, intimidating group of men, all wearing fancy suits. The meeting went well and the
financiers agreed to sell the lodge to Geezil, who had already had the $35,000 wired to a local bank.
This minor business now settled, the financiers sat back in their chairs and began to banter about high
finance, throwing out the name “J. P. Morgan” as if they knew the man. Finally one of them noticed the
boxer in the corner of the room. Weil explained what he was doing there. The financier countered that he
too had a boxer in his entourage, whom he named. Weil laughed brazenly and exclaimed that his man
could easily knock out their man. Conversation escalated into argument. In the heat of passion, Weil
challenged the men to a bet. The financiers eagerly agreed and left to get their man ready for a fight the
next day.
As soon as they had left, the uncle yelled at Weil, right in front of Geezil; They did not have enough
money to bet with, and once the financiers discovered this, the uncle would be fired. Weil apologized for
getting him in this mess, but he had a plan: He knew the other boxer well, and with a little bribe, they
could fix the fight. But where would the money come from for the bet? the uncle replied. Without it they
were as good as dead. Finally Geezil had heard enough. Unwilling to jeopardize his deal with any ill
will, he offered his own $35,000 cash for part of the bet. Even if he lost that, he would wire for more
money and still make a profit on the sale of the lodge. The uncle and nephew thanked him. With their own
$15,000 and Geezil’s $35,000 they would manage to have enough for the bet. That evening, as Geezil
watched the two boxers rehearse the fix in the hotel room, his mind reeled at the killing he was going to
make from both the boxing match and the sale of the lodge.
The fight took place in a gym the next day. Weil handled the cash, which was placed for security in a
locked box. Everything was proceeding as planned in the hotel room. The financiers were looking glum at
how badly their fighter was doing, and Geezil was dreaming about the easy money he was about to make.
Then, suddenly, a wild swing by the financier’s fighter hit Gross hard in the face, knocking him down.
When he hit the canvas, blood spurted from his mouth. He coughed, then lay still. One of the financiers, a